Infinity rig will be used at an estimated 800 mph (1300 km/h) freefall.

Here, the Infinity rig manufacturer Kelly Farrington talks more about the rig design. He mentiones the drogue that is independent (but not neccessarily) from main or reserve parachute deployment system:

Kelly is down in Florida for the Skydive Expo, so he wont be back until next week. As soon as he returns home, he'll be getting a "routine" full-body type cavity search / Manufacturing Facility Inspection / "Hi, I'm from the FAA and I'm here to help" type of visit... I'll be phoning in sick. (That wasn't very professional, now was it? )

Every few years, the FAA see's fit to inspect TSO holders. They make their rounds verifying that we continue to manufacture according to our QC system. They also have a knack for scheduling these visits at the most inconvenient times.

Anyway, in short, it may be a couple of weeks before Kelly see's this.

In reply to:

Kelly - can you outline all the differences between a regular Infinity (like mine ), and the one that will be used by Felix?

This bit of info probably can't legally be released until after the jump.

I'm not sure if I want to put ALL of the differences in print, and I'm not sure exactly what I'm free to discuss about the project, but the main differences you see are probably the pockets for the oxygen bottles on the sides of the rig, and some extra flaps on the reserve pin cover flap. I turned the pin cover into another container for the drogue pilot chute, and put a small container for the drogue at the top of the backpad. The footage of Felix in droguefall in that video isn't the rig or the drogue that we built. That's from earlier in the program, before we were brought on board. The jump is planned to be a true freefall, with no drogue- it's there incase stability or excess speed becomes an issue- therefore it does not act as a pilot chute for either canopy and gets released when either ripcord is pulled.

The handles are also in different locations, and shaped differently since Felix will have limited mobility and visibility when the suit is pressurized.

I don't think they have a firm date for the jump yet, as there are still plenty of things getting worked out for the project.

1 ...type and size of main will be used? 2 ...type and size reserve? 3 ...type of AAD, and how many of them will be used?

I designed both the custom main and the reserve canopies specifically for this jump. The canopies were produced by Precision Aerodynamics in Dunlap TN and have been going through test jumps "at altitude" for some time now.

I won't get into the design details just yet, but that will come in time. Suffice it to say, these are not your normal everyday skydiving canopies.

Regarding AADs, that's not my sandbox, and I'm not sure of the details.

i imagine there will be a high pucker factor on the cypres team. imagine a premature firing at 100,000+ feet! i wonder if there is a plan for this, or any situation that put the reserve out that high. i can't see felix taking enough oxygen to last for that long of a canopy ride.

i imagine there will be a high pucker factor on the cypres team. imagine a premature firing at 100,000+ feet! i wonder if there is a plan for this, or any situation that put the reserve out that high. i can't see felix taking enough oxygen to last for that long of a canopy ride.

I'd put the Cypres on the main, or a reserve on a tersh that could be cut away, that way, if it fires too high, you can still chop it.

so, at the altitudes discussed, water does indeed spontaneously boil. the amount of force keeping water in solution goes down as air pressure drops at altitude.

The boiling point eventually drops to 98.6 degrees F, and whammo....your blood boils. the medical term for this unfortunate condition is "ebullism".

The exact altitude at which it happens depends on barometric pressure and temperature, but in general we just say that it occurs around 63,000'. (called the "Armstrong Line")

Consequently, folks wishing to exit at that altitude need to be wearing some kind of pressure suit in order to prevent their inside parts from becoming their outside parts.

The world record jumper is Colonel Joseph Kittinger. I'm sure this isn't news to most of you, but in 1960 he jumped at 102,000'. (if you're not familiar with the story of his life, you should look into it. Not only is he credited with this heroic feat, he's also a combat pilot from Vietnam with two Silver Stars and a Prisoner of War Medal which he earned during his stay at the Hanoi Hilton)

Now, on to the "speed of sound" issue. The rate that sound travels depends on the medium that it's traveling through. In dry air, at room temperature it's 768mph. In water sound travels several times faster (~3300mph) and in a vacuum, sound doesn't travel at all.

If "Fearless Felix" is able to exit at 120,000 will he "break the sound barrier"? Well, maybe, but not in the traditional way we think of it. He'll continue to accelerate (at a rate less than the 9.8m/s/s that Newton's Apple fell) until he reaches a terminal velocity for given conditions. The force required to push his body through the sound barrier isn't linear and I suspect that as he approaches that limit he'll experience a spike in relative drag that will serve to buffer him from supersonic speeds. If I'm wrong, the transition into supersonic flight is likely to be very rough for him. I suspect he'll become extremely unstable at that point. Traditional flight positions would be very dangerous.

All-in-all, it's a fascinating project that I'd love to be working on. Very jealous!